Honda Amaze : Official Review

This is a discussion on Honda Amaze : Official Review within Official New Car Reviews, part of the Team-BHP Reviews category; Can anyone please help me out? Which one is the engine oil recomended for the idtech Amaze? I found the ...

Can anyone please help me out? Which one is the engine oil recomended for the idtech Amaze? I found the oil level quite low when i checked it and the service interval is atleast 4 months away. I thought of filling it up by myself rather than taking it to the service centre.

Can anyone please help me out? Which one is the engine oil recomended for the idtech Amaze? I found the oil level quite low when i checked it and the service interval is atleast 4 months away. I thought of filling it up by myself rather than taking it to the service centre.

Honda uses low friction semi synthetic oil. So, I would recommend that you use the same engine oil provided by Honda. And you should also get to the bottom of the engine oil dip. So, a service center visit is highly recommended in your case.

23,000 kms in 55 days translates to an average of 418 Kms a day. Something that most of the cabs like Airport Logans and Innovas do in a single day in B2B traffic (remember the strains engines undergo?) here in Bengaluru. Rather, they have been doing this even after clocking more than 3 lakh kms on the ODO without a fuss.

Sorry but did Honda want to show that their cars can withstand abuse of "Normal Highway driving" day after day for being driven 400+ kms each day (even if that meant one drives 800 on day 1 and 100 on day 2)??

Personally, I am OK to see this as a marketing stunt but nothing at all when it comes to claiming reliability and frugality (if that is what the intention is) of an automobile from a modern era.

Bad roads for one whole day and excellent roads over the next 10 days. I am sure the assortment would have been something like this unless the Amaze was driven only in non tolled kuccha roads of our country.

I congratulate the drivers for this feat for the endurance shown and the efforts put. Well done!

Agree with you Parag. The average per day is too small a number for a record. I dont know, but may be there wasnt a similar record, hence this gets registered? Its purely a marketing gimmick. Good out of the box thinking this though.

23,000 kms in 55 days translates to an average of 418 Kms a day. Something that most of the cabs like Airport Logans and Innovas do in a single day in B2B traffic (remember the strains engines undergo?) here in Bengaluru. Rather, they have been doing this even after clocking more than 3 lakh kms on the ODO without a fuss.

Sorry but did Honda want to show that their cars can withstand abuse of "Normal Highway driving" day after day for being driven 400+ kms each day (even if that meant one drives 800 on day 1 and 100 on day 2)??

Personally, I am OK to see this as a marketing stunt but nothing at all when it comes to claiming reliability and frugality (if that is what the intention is) of an automobile from a modern era.

Bad roads for one whole day and excellent roads over the next 10 days. I am sure the assortment would have been something like this unless the Amaze was driven only in non tolled kuccha roads of our country.

I congratulate the drivers for this feat for the endurance shown and the efforts put. Well done!

Thanks for the congratulations Parag
Yes, the daily avg is pretty less (23800km in 53 actually or 449km per day) but do consider the following:
1. As per Guinness regulations, we couldn't take the same route twice - if taken, this is deducted from the final figure.
2. 23800 includes superb highways, normal highways, hilly terrains, no roads, off-road paths, nature's fury (floods / cyclones) and so on
3. It wasnt just a daily drive but shooting pictures, video-graphing the journey, attending press cons, meeting customers etc. This did slow us down a lot but was very essential at the same time
4. We had a few rest days - and services / check-ups of the car

Quote:

Originally Posted by funkykar

Agree with you Parag. The average per day is too small a number for a record. I dont know, but may be there wasnt a similar record, hence this gets registered? Its purely a marketing gimmick. Good out of the box thinking this though.

Hi Funky

The category of record is "longest drive by a car in a single country" - this was previously held by a Nano, broken by friends in Russia, broken by a couple from Odhisha (18458km)

1. As per Guinness regulations, we couldn't take the same route twice - if taken, this is deducted from the final figure.

Fair enough and considering we have more than 30Lakh kms of road Network encompassing Expressways, NHs, SHs, District and Rural roads, it makes sense not to take the same route if eyeing for a record. What would have mattered here is planning the entire circuit.

Part and Parcel of such road trips. Isn’t it? A simple Leh to Kanyakumari especially via Manali route can make one experience all of the above test cases with one of the slowest roads in terms of progress and when one does the same, it is just a usual road trip and not a record. In fact, roads to Bhutan are even worse!

Driving in cyclone hit areas is just driving under unpredictable conditions of mother nature. It so happened last year that knowing that the cyclone Phalin had made touchdown on east coast that we set on a drive driving anti-clockwise on the GQ. Chennai to Odisha was the worst with flooded roads, wipers at full speed for more than 12 hours and watching the rehab centers set-up all along the medians in Odhisha.

Quote:

3. It wasnt just a daily drive but shooting pictures, video-graphing the journey, attending press cons, meeting customers etc. This did slow us down a lot but was very essential at the same time

This makes the drive more interesting and this is exactly where your co-driver will come to rescue when it comes to operating the camera and moving those essential clips from the Dashcam onto a storage device. I am sure since you mention meeting the customers and press conferences, It was indeed a Honda event?

Quote:

4. We had a few rest days - and services / check-ups of the car

For a drive spanning 53 days, rest is of paramount importance both for the body and the mind. The car however should perform flawlessly given the fact that it wasn’t taking any severe abuse apart from being driven in all types of roads. Necessary fluid changes, torquing of under chassis and suspension related bolts due to bad road and general mechanical inspection becomes a need for such drives like how we take the car to the nearest FNG while in Ladakh, put it on hoist and check for any damages due to the bad roads taken.

There have been too many records off late and it so happens that people have ended up driving for records. At the same time many others may have driven as part of their planned drive too but were never aware that it could perhaps get into the record books!!

The only reason I had to post my comment is for the fact that I may have either missed something extra-ordinary that may have been part of this record (which is not the case) or because this is simply a usual drive covering Indian highways under normal circumstances.

For driving 23,000 in 53 days, you need –

Better drivers

Excellent rapport within the occupants - Bear with their loo breaks & other habits etc.

Extreme levels of patience – In bearing the Traffic, diversity, mess and your own partner

Co-ordination in terms of the co-driver helping you navigate you through the tricky places and petty towns

Basic to little advanced troubleshooting abilities in case of any breakdown

In the end I will still say this is more to do with the driver than the car itself and hence I commended you first. Honda is only lucky that they got the best hands (and minds) to perform this.

Anyways, thanks again for your response. I wouldn't want to divulge this into an altogether different topic as this thread is the Official review about Amaze. It is only because I read Record and I wondered what did the Amaze do.

Petrol Amaze owners, have a question. Does the engine get better wrt to power delivery say after 10,000 Kms or so? Dad has an Amaze which be bought last March. I am still searching for those 80+ horses everytime I take her out on the highway
City drive is alright and stress free thanks to the light steering. But overtaking on the highways, its completely hopeless. The car struggles even when I downshift to 3rd. Mileage isn't great as well. It returns about 11-13 in mixed driving conditions (Cochin).

Petrol Amaze owners, have a question. Does the engine get better wrt to power delivery say after 10,000 Kms or so? Dad has an Amaze which be bought last March. I am still searching for those 80+ horses everytime I take her out on the highway
City drive is alright and stress free thanks to the light steering. But overtaking on the highways, its completely hopeless. The car struggles even when I downshift to 3rd. Mileage isn't great as well. It returns about 11-13 in mixed driving conditions (Cochin).

Low bottom end torque is the real problem with this engine. The powerband of this engine is from 4000 rpm to 6500 rpm. You keep your revs in between this and you will be satisfied. You drop below 4000 rpm on a two lane highway for overtaking something long like a truck, you have to backoff. You simply can't. I don't have the amaze but talking about the Jazz petrol which has 3 more horses.

I had been getting this "grrrr" sound from the AC blower which was quite loud when at speeds 2/3. This sound was from bits of paper ( toll receipts ) in the glove box that gets sucked inside. Got them removed at 26 K kms and I face the same issue again at 30 K kms. Got them cleaned again.

At 30 K kms , my vibrating centre rear view mirror still hasn't been resolved. Right from day one , it's been vibrating at cruising speeds of 60-80 kph. This vibration disappears mysteriously at speeds above 2000 rpm. The idiots at the Honds service said they have resolved this and what did they do ? They tightened the mirror so much that you needed both hands to adjust the mirror ...but it would still vibrate !

Also , the advisor was talking about a complete AC system cleaning at 40 K kms which supposedly takes 2 days and 3K INR to be done.

The car struggles even when I downshift to 3rd. Mileage isn't great as well. It returns about 11-13 in mixed driving conditions.

As already mentioned by 300 KMPH, bottom end or pulling power at low rpm's is not a strong point for the 1.2l. The engine just about cuts it for a Brio. It is economical when driven with a light foot, not otherwise.

At 31 K kms , looks like I am on my way to have my second set of brake pads ! The earlier ones were replaced at 18 K KMS.

I will update once I have them checked this weekend .

Also , I notice that the FE starts dropping upwards of 10 K kms of using the airfilter . Honda recommends a 20 K kms replace interval , but I can see a massive difference on changing the filter . I would recommend an air filter replacement every 10 K kms depending on usage .